


Manifesto

by cupidsbow



Category: Lord of the Rings RPF
Genre: Angst, M/M, Threesome, cupidsbow
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-09-28
Updated: 2008-09-28
Packaged: 2017-10-02 01:16:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cupidsbow/pseuds/cupidsbow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Elijah discovers a problem with having a sexual manifesto.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Manifesto

“I don’t wanna think about a single bloody thing tonight. I just want to live in my skin,” Orlando said. He made the announcement to the three of them, as he always did, with no sign of embarrassment at all.

Viggo rolled his eyes. Dom snorted around his mouthful of beer, sending a little trickle down the corner of his mouth. Elijah was too busy watching Dom to react; he could see that Dom was itching to make a snide comment. Probably something about Orlando’s skin having a higher IQ than his brain, with all the thinking he did with it. Which would be pretty rich, coming from Dom, who usually lived with everything right there on the surface for the whole fucking world to see.

Dom swallowed the beer and opened his mouth, and Elijah just couldn’t bear it. If he had to listen to Dom and Orlando rip at each other in one of their not-quite-friendly, not-quite-mock fights tonight, he’d… well, he wasn’t exactly sure what he’d do, but it would probably be something all three of them would regret tomorrow.

“Me too,” Elijah blurted, and as a diversionary tactic it looked, for a brief moment, like it might actually work.

Dom’s mouth snapped shut again, and he glared at Elijah, but at least there was no sniping happening. A definite plus.

Until Viggo, seemingly oblivious to the tension, arched an ironic eyebrow, and followed Elijah’s conversational lead. “You want to live in Orlando’s skin?”

And, okay, _fuck_! That wasn’t the kind of diversion Elijah had been hoping for. In fact, it wasn’t a diversion so much as a huge, flashing neon light that illuminated the ever-present pink elephant that he, Dom and Orlando had been carefully avoiding for weeks.

“You can share my skin anytime, baby,” Orlando said, leering at Elijah.

And it didn’t help that Orlando sounded like sex; like long, drawn-out, so-good-it-hurts sex, and, just like that, Elijah was hard. Aching with it. He couldn’t help it.

Dom stared at Elijah accusingly, then looked down into his beer, face closed and tight.

Elijah hated feeling ashamed of the lust thrumming through him. But he was. He’d _promised_ Dom that he wouldn’t fool around with Orlando. Of course, at the time, he’d had no fucking idea how hard that promise would be to keep. Back then he’d only felt the first, faint twinges of desire; not this acid wash of longing that had been slowly growing inside him. He hadn’t known that his skin could corrode with want—needing Orlando’s callused hands to sooth the pain.

But not knowing wasn’t really a good enough excuse for breaking a promise, was it? Giving in would still be a shitty thing to do. Compared to what Dom was going through, Elijah’s desire was just a tiny, new, untested thing. So letting himself have hot, hard, x-rated fun with Orlando, when it was Dom who was actually desperate to come out, would be more than shitty. Especially as Dom had no choice but to keep his dick in his pants and his mouth shut, day after week after month, even though it went against every exhibitionist instinct he had.

That’s why he and Dom had made the pact in the first place. Why they’d sworn out a no-gay-sex-until-after-filming-is-over manifesto.

How long would Dom last if Elijah fell off the wagon? And what kind of friend would Elijah be if he couldn’t do this one thing for Dom?

Watching Dom trying his best to keep it all buttoned down sucked in a way Elijah had never experienced before. And even though he hated it, Elijah couldn’t find it in himself to blame Dom for the way he kept taking cheap shots at Orlando.

But Elijah _was_ beginning to hate Billy, which was totally unfair. It’s not like Billy was straight _on purpose_… so straight it sometimes hurt Elijah’s eyes to look at him, and he could only _imagine_ what it must be like for Dom to love someone so much and have to hold back all the time.

Except… maybe Elijah was starting to know what that felt like. Because maybe what he was feeling for Orlando _was_ new and untried. Maybe it was still small. But not being able to give it a chance to grow was poisoning everything. His friendship with Dom. How he felt about Billy. His reactions to casual comments by oblivious bystanders like Viggo.

And worst of all… it was spoiling every slightly-confused, overly-heated look he shared with Orlando.

“Much as I’m enjoying this trip to the sullen side,” Viggo said, drinking the last gulp of his beer, and getting up, “I’m going to leave you lot to it.”

It was a relief to watch Viggo go, even though the uncomfortable silence thickened. Elijah was tempted to bail out himself, before something tragic happened. It was becoming increasing clear that the three of them were headed for disaster. Elijah knew it, and from the caustic comments that Dom kept on throwing at Orlando, it was clear that Dom knew it too. God alone knew what Orlando thought of the situation. Elijah hadn’t dared to bring it up.

But, please God, not tonight. Whatever it was they were headed for… not _yet_.

Tonight, Elijah just wanted to go with Orlando’s plan… he wanted to stop thinking, to live in his skin, to be with his friends while they both still were his friends. And surely there had to be a way to keep everything from falling apart. Surely?

He looked over at the dance floor, at the wildly gyrating bodies, limned in strobes of ultraviolet. It was a disjointed mess; the music blood-pounding; the whole scene like the last party before the end of the world.

Elijah had never been into mobs, something about them scared him a little, but feeling the rhythm through the table, jarring down his spine and up into his eyelids, he found himself wanting to join in, become one small cog in a huge, mindless machine. He wanted to jump onboard and take the ride to the inevitable end with his heart racing and his brain offline.

It had to be better than this.

He caught Orlando’s gaze. “Come on then,” he said, going with instinct, “let’s dance.”

Orlando smiled, and it was only as the hard line of his jaw softened that Elijah realised how tense he’d been.

“Hell yes!” Orlando replied, and slid out of the booth.

Elijah stood up. “You too,” he said, holding his hand out to Dom.

Dom was still scowling into his beer, refusing to meet Elijah’s eyes. “Nah. Three’s a crowd and all that.”

“Bollocks.” Orlando pressed himself against Elijah’s back, wrapping an arm around his shoulders. “Three’s not a crowd, Dom. Three’s an orgy waiting to happen.”

The strobe light spiked into Elijah’s eyes, and the world suddenly looked like a strange place…

_orgy_

…and Orlando was right there, pressed up behind him. And Dom was right there, sitting in front of him. And, really, he should have _known_ that Orlando would be the one to solve a problem like this.

Elijah put his hand on Dom’s neck, not ashamed anymore that he wanted so much. “Dom, we’re not leaving you here alone.”

And maybe the world was falling apart, maybe this was an ending… but so what? So what, as long as there was a morning after, and the three of them had something new to be tense about?

Dom looked up, his eyes glassy with unshed tears. “You don’t need me out there just so you can pretend everything’s alright.”

And the light was so bright, blindingly bright. Making everything clear. Burning Elijah from the inside out. He was on fire, and not just for Orlando, who was pressed against his back like the lover he wasn’t yet.

“Fuck need!” Orlando said. “We _want_ you.”

Elijah leaned in, speaking loudly so that both Dom and Orlando would hear his words over the relentless _da da de dum dum dum_; and with a soundtrack like that, how had it taken him so long to get that this was it; the final moment; the end. “We don’t want to do this without you, Dom.”

Beneath Elijah’s fingers, Dom’s neck felt like fire. Like fear. Like all kinds of right. And he couldn’t help thinking, _How bad can the fallout be, as long we’re facing it together_?

“You’re both insane,” Dom said, but the beer glass was falling out of his hand, rolling across the table, and the insipient tears were gone and his eyes were full of _yes_. “It won’t work.”

“So?” Elijah twisted his fingers into Dom’s hair. “As long as the music’s loud enough, we won't hear the world falling apart.”


End file.
